Views from the Choir Loft

Catholic Artists Society

Fr. David Friel · September 8, 2013 ·

NE DAY OVER THE SUMMER, I made a day trip to New York City. My main purpose was to apply for a visa at the Brazilian consulate in order to go to World Youth Day. As I walked from Penn Station to the consulate, though, I happened to pass by the exquisite Church of Our Savior on Park Avenue. Amid many blocks of unremarkable skyscrapers and apartment complexes, this church stood out as quite an impressive building. The door was open, so I stopped in to make a visit. Upon leaving, I took a copy of their bulletin, in which I discovered that their then-pastor was the eminent Fr. George Rutler.

Another thing I discovered in the bulletin was information about The Catholic Artists Society. After checking out the group online when I got home, it seems like a very worthwhile society. In conjunction with the Thomistic Institute, they will present an exciting lecture series over the next few months. Here are the speakers and topics:

Art: For Whose Sake? (Gregory Wolfe, Editor, Image Journal)

The Responsibility of the Artist (Fr. Peter John Cameron, OP, editor, Magnificat)

Forming the Artist (David Clayton, Thomas More College)

Beauty and the Real (Alice Ramos, St. John’s University)

Love and Artistic Genesis (Anthony Esolen, Providence College)

Virtue and the Artistic Imagination (Fr. Joseph Koterski, SJ, Fordham University)

Anyone who lives within traveling distance to the Big Apple, take note. The series will be held on Saturday nights at 7:30 PM in the heart of Greenwich Village. These lectures look very worthwhile.

About Fr. David Friel

Ordained in 2011, Father Friel served for five years as Parochial Vicar at St. Anselm Parish in Northeast Philly. He is currently a doctoral candidate in liturgical theology at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.

Could Pope St. Pius X Sing?

“On 12 March 1908, the complete publication of the Roman Gradual was issued by the Vatican Press. On that very day, Dom Pothier solemnly presented the first copy to the Holy Father. A witness of the audience says that Pius X wished to be the first to see the new book; he opened it at random, at page 128 of the supplement pro aliquibus locis—it was the Introit of the new Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes. The Pope sang it with perfect taste to the last note.” (Catholic Choirmaster, February 1915)

—Jeff Ostrowski

Julius Bas Accompaniment

A very prolific harmonizer of Gregorian chant in the early 20th century was Mr. Julius Bas. He often uses a very strange technique, wherein he employs rests to eliminate the Alto, Tenor, and Bass voices. Consider what he did with “Lumen ad revelationem” here:

* JPEG • Lumen ad revelationem

It seems quite lazy, and I’ve never seen anyone else use such a technique, although Dr. Peter Wagner often switched to parallel octaves when he ran out of ideas… (Yuck!)

—Jeff Ostrowski

Hitting wrong notes

Fr. Valentine Young, OFM, used to say: “The organist can play 1,000 correct notes and one wrong note—and the only thing people will care about is the wrong note.” Last Sunday I hit some wrong notes, and felt bad. Then I remembered a story about Rudolf Serkin and started to chuckle. Charles Rosen (or was it Leon Fleisher?) told the story of Serkin playing a Beethoven Sonata in front of a large audience. The theme is all in octaves; but Serkin hit some wrong notes, and played parallel 7ths instead. This so unnerved him that every time the theme returned, he played the entire thing in parallel 7ths! We must remember that even the greatest hit wrong notes. Alfred Cortot, Vladimir Horowitz, Wilhelm Backhaus, Edwin Fischer, Sviatoslav Richter, Egon Petri—they all hit wrong notes, which we can hear on recordings. (Josef Hofmann was an exception, but he was super-human so he doesn’t count!)

—Jeff Ostrowski